One palpal organ is usually inserted at a time, and, after a while, taken out, and replaced by the other; this change being repeated many times by the same spider. Among the _Lycosidæ_, Fig. 10, the male leaps on the back of the female, and is carried about by her, Fig. 52. He reaches down at the side of her abdomen, and inserts his palpi in the epigynum underneath. In _Linyphia_ and _Theridion_ the male and female live peaceably together for a long time in the same web. The male reaches from in front under the female, Fig. 53, and inserts his palpal organs, one after the other, for hours together. In _Agalena_ the male is the stronger of the two sexes. He takes the female in his mandibles, and lays her on one side, Fig. 54, and inserts one of his palpi. After a time, he rises on tiptoe, turns her around and over, so that she lies on the other side, with her head in the opposite direction, and inserts the other palpus. The female lies as though dead. In _Nephila_ and _Argiope_, where the male is very small, he stands on the upper edge of the web while the female is in her usual position in the centre. After feeling the web with his feet for some time, he runs down to the centre so lightly as not to disturb the female, and climbs about over her body for some minutes, in an apparently aimless way. She takes no notice of him at first; but at length, especially if he approach the under side of her abdomen, she turns, and snaps at him with her jaws. He is usually nimble enough to dodge between her legs, and drop out of the web, and, after a while, climbs up to the top, and begins over again. In these encounters the males are often injured; they frequently lose some of their legs: and I have seen one, that had only four out of his eight left, still standing up to his work. [Illustration: Fig. 53.] [Illustration: Fig. 54.] [Illustration: Fig. 55.] At length the male succeeds in getting under the female’s abdomen, and inserting his palpi into the epigynum. Fig. 55 shows the female hanging in the web, with the male at _a_, with his legs grasped around her abdomen. The habits of these spiders furnish the grounds for the popular story, that female spiders regularly eat the males. No doubt it occasionally happens, where the female is the larger of the two; but in many species they live together for some time in the same web, or in a nest spun for the purpose; in some cases, before the female has reached the adult state. LAYING EGGS. When the eggs are mature, the female proceeds, like the male, to make a little web, and lays the eggs on it. Then she covers them over with silk, forming a cocoon, in which the young remain till some time after they are hatched. The laying of the eggs is seldom seen; for the spider does it in the night, or in retired places; and often, in confinement, refuses to lay at all. [Illustration: Fig. 56.]